Council to shut and curb opening of hours of over a dozen libraries as cuts bite

A SCOTS council is to shut down and curb the opening hours of over a dozen libraries as part of multi-million pound cuts and savings for the year ahead.

South Ayrshire Council said its priority in bridging a financial black hole of around £10milion was to protect "essential or life and limb services", describing its budget as its most difficult ever.

The authority's plans also include getting rid of 13 additional support needs school assistants to save £200,000 and cutting funding to a scheme form troubled youngsters in half.

In addition, cleaning operations around the council's popular seafront areas will be cut, school meal prices increased and a scheme to revitalise Ayr cut by £60,000.

Three rural libraries, in Coylton, Dailly and Dundonald, will close completely. Ten others, at Alloway, Ballantrae, Carnegie, Forehill, Girvan, Maybole, Mossblown, Symington, Tarbolton and Troon, will have their hours reduced.

In total, the moves will save the council less than £150,000. It said the near £10m it had to find was "the highest amount of savings the council has had to deliver in any one financial year".

A meeting will be held in the near future to seed where unallocated reserves of £14.6m will be spent.

Bill McIntosh, council leader, said: “The combined impact of the reduction and restrictions in the Scottish Government funding, rising costs and increasing, and sometimes unprecedented, demand for our services is that the gap between the money we have and the money we need continues to grow.

“That means we can no longer avoid making difficult choices and hard decisions, decisions which, in normal circumstances, we would not take. "However, we cannot live beyond our means and we need to do all we can to protect and sustain essential services, the ones that really matter in terms of life or limb, for the future."

Deputy leader John McDowall added: “In agreeing the budget today, we’ve worked to protect and preserve services as much as possible, while delivering the necessary savings to plug the funding gap. We’ve done this by looking at services and facilities that are not used as much as others; taking account of alternative provision; and considering the overall cost to the council and the benefit to the community.

“We know this will affect our people and places, but we have, quite simply, had no choice and we’ll continue to do everything we can to minimise the impact of these savings when introduced.”

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